Here’s a quick, subjective survey of the live-action movies and TV shows Batman has inspired:

BATMAN (1943): This 15-part, Saturday matinee serial was the first live-action interpretation of the comic strip. It starred Lewis Wilson as the Caped Crusader and Douglas Croft as Robin. There was an anti-Japanese, wartime propaganda vibe to it, and it apparently showed the Batcave before it appeared in the comics. I’ve seen a few episodes, and remember them looking like something I could have made in my basement – and that Robin needed a haircut.

BATMAN AND ROBIN (1949): Another 15-chapter serial, unseen by me, with the slightly better remembered Robert Lowery and Johnny Duncan playing the title roles.

BATMAN (1966-1968): The TV show that defined Hollywood’s conception of camp — and its generation of producers’ clueless disdain for all things comic book — was a huge hit at first and reviled by just about everybody within two years. Still, even us comics fans who hated the series’ dismissive tone retain soft spots for its marvelously deadpan stars Adam West and Burt Ward. And why wouldn’t we? We still watched every episode.

BATMAN — THE MOVIE (1966): Big-screen version of the TV show.

BATMAN (1989): Yay! Finally, a big-budget Bat-movie by an A-list director (Tim Burton) who should get it. Not so yay: The thing has all the energy of a museum installation; Jack Nicholson’s Joker is even campier than Cesar Romero’s; and comedian Michael Keaton as the Dark Knight detective? Really? Oh well.

BATMAN RETURNS (1992): Keaton’s still starring and Burton’s in the director’s chair again, but they really seem to have gone back to the drawing board for this one and made a more kinetic, borderline noirish and better movie. Superb casting of Michelle Pfeiffer as a kooky/kinky Catwoman and Danny DeVito as a truly repulsive Penguin made this the most distinctive Batshow yet.

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BATMAN FOREVER (1995): As one wag accurately said at the time, was that a title or a threat? The seemingly surefire casting of Jim Carrey as the Riddler and Tommy Lee Jones as Two-Face didn’t prove nearly as effective as the previous film’s rogues’ gallery had. Adding Robin to the proceedings was just distracting. Vulgarian director Joel Schumacher convinced us once and for all that, yeah, Burton must really be an artist. Val Kilmer was a more interesting Bruce Wayne than Keaton was, though.

BATMAN & ROBIN (1997): Since Schumacher couldn’t stand Kilmer, he replaced the actor with George Clooney for his second Batfilm. The gracious Clooney has taken personal responsibility for killing the series, but really, the only thing he did wrong was agree to wear that Batsuit with the erect nipples. Everything else about this movie was much, much worse.

CATWOMAN (2004): Asked the burning question: Is Halle Berry hotter than Julie Newmar, Eartha Kitt, Lee Meriweather or Pfeiffer? The answer was impossible to determine from this lifeless mess of a movie.

BATMAN BEGINS (2005): With nothing left to lose, DC’s corporate cousin Warner Bros. gave up-and-coming English indie director Christopher Nolan creative carte blanche to reboot the franchise. The result was the darkest, most serious Batman movie yet, with Christian Bale evoking the angst that drove the comic book Wayne, finally, onscreen.

THE DARK KNIGHT (2008): For their second outing, Nolan and Bale simply made the greatest comic book movie of all time. It’s powered by Heath Ledger’s incomparably imaginative take on the Joker and a script that processed the new century’s greatest fears through a prism of pop-culture mythology.

THE DARK KNIGHT RISES (2012): Nolan tried to keep it relevant and Bale dug deeper into the damaged soul, but bloat and hubris is evident in this trilogy closer. Still lots of great stuff, but it’s unwieldy at the very least, pretentious at its worst.